Serious What should we do about bullying?

[capefeather]

While I do think that the anecdotes are unhelpful, an argument can be formulated in many ways, and the posts that are being called "butthurt" are still arguments, even if they're "emotional". To expect people to be stoic all the time is a "Straw Vulcan" oversimplification of how arguments work, and ignores the fact that arguments are necessarily driven by some foundational goal, something to protect and generally feel strongly about. I haven't watched much Star Trek but even Spock has expressed statements along the lines of empathizing with the struggles of others. An argument without any apparent foundation merely has a hidden foundation that the arguer is (intentionally or not) smuggling in, and it's easy to criticize the parties for whom the foundation is obvious. I don't know, I just find it kind of disingenuous to criticize the "butthurt" when really every party can be criticized for their role in the vitriol-spewing.

I think the bigger problem is the straw man that some people have constructed that the goal is to eradicate all suffering. Supposedly, all these bleeding heart liberals ultimately aspire toward a perfectly happy society where everybody's forced into an opium-induced blissful coma and robots do all the maintenance work, or some other such nonsense. Ultimately this is the "argument" that's being refuted by saying, "Shit happens. Deal with it." Applied to more down-to-earth issues like "how to mitigate [the negative impacts of] bullying," it becomes incredibly silly, as several others have already demonstrated.

This gets into another issue I'm finding is that posting about how to deal with bullying is irrelevant to the topic at hand. The topic at hand is "how to mitigate [the negative impacts of] bullying," and if you talk solely about what the victim could do, you shouldn't be surprised if people interpret you as suggesting that outside parties should do nothing. Putting the focus squarely on the bully victim is to model him/her as an Ideal Rational Person(TM), which is ridiculous enough when applied to adults... It's nice to say that children should execute the perfect way of dealing with bullying to reasonably minimize the damage and reasonably maximize the benefit, but children have to actually, y'know, learn how to do so. And that's what this entire discussion is trying to address in the first place!

I know that some people love to believe that they have infinite free will and they can change everything about themselves at will, but even time travel can't give you that.

Also, something I wanted to talk about in the OP: Psychologists tell you to focus on improving yourself (albeit they should generally also teach you how to do so) because that really is the most effective approach to dealing with relationships. After all, you know yourself far better than you know other people.

 

[faint]

I'm just going to settle some shit here since some of you seem delusional.

To answer the question in the topic: http://www.stopbullying.gov/what-you-can-do/index.html

For those saying bullying is helpful: First off, I don't care that you were being bullied for being a fat transgendered kid with cancer. You're literally having a pissing content over who got shit on more on a fucking Pokemon forum. Nobody feels bad for you. Secondly, whether or not you actually believe it helps is 100% subjective, BUT WE ARE TRYING TO MITIGATE BULLYING HERE SO WHY THE FUCK DOES YOUR OPINION MATTER

"Toughen up you pussy!!!!": alphonse_elric's post did a good job at explaining the stupidity with your fallacy.

And for the rest of you: Saying is not doing. You're pretty much all acting like SJWs right now. If you actually want to help click that link above and find a real way. And don't put this shit back on me because first off, blow me, and secondly, I don't claim to know what to do about bullying. This post is just to show that most of you are idiots.

delete/infract/ban/edit if old.

 

[billymills]

Can we tone it down just a little here. I get that you're trying to mitigate bullying, but telling people to go kill themselves is a bit of a mixed message.

 

[Surgo]

I think the thing that really bothers me about bullying is that I have yet to come up with a better answer than "fight back". That of course has two problems:

1: It's not always reasonable, like if you're a kid and the person bullying you has 20 pounds on you that is just a total non-starter.

2: It's a local optimum but not a global optimum. Fighting back and winning improves things for that person, but the bully is just going to go and pick on someone else and the state of the world, as it were, is unchanged.

 

[faint]

Can we tone it down just a little here. I get that you're trying to mitigate bullying, but telling people to go kill themselves is a bit of a mixed message.

Maybe, but I said it out of endearment because all I want is for them to be a stronger person. By being a bully myself I was looking out for them since bullying is necessary for our development.

 

[Imanalt]

Fighting back also has a lot of flaws... largely in that a lot of the time the entire goal of the bully or bullies is to get you to fight back, because the way a lot of school environments are set up, fighting back is a good way to get in a lot of trouble, while they escape with very little. And I think this type of a situation is created by schools trying to have it both ways in enforcement. They try to have strict enforcement on issues between students, especially ones that get physical (often requiring multiday suspensions for punching, etc), and yet don't put enough effort into this enforcement to really have a good idea of what happened, and the causes behind it. Basically schools can't have it both ways. If they want to not spend money, then they have to let things go more, because trying to halfass enforcement doesn't work. Unfortunately our political climates in the us leave little choice on whether schools can spend money on this kind of thing...

 

[Flechazo]

Edit: perhaps a major problem with this thread is it never differentiated pre- and post-pubescent bullying. Theyre two very different problems, with very different causes. I mostly experienced prepubescent bullying. What elcheeso describes seems like it happened later—in high school. The two are quite different

I think a major problem with this thread is that it currently lacks distinct and differential definitions for, I suppose, the "tiers" of bullying: teasing, harassment, and actual bullying.

From Google:

Teasing -make fun of or attempt to provoke (a person or animal) in a playful way. Oftentimes teasing is friendly; however, it can used to hurt one's feelings--but doesn't necessarily does so if one has a healthful self-esteem.

Harassment - aggressive pressure or intimidation. Unlike teasing, harassment is never friendly. Now for bullying:

Bullying -us[ing] superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants. Like harassment, intimidation is used; however, bullying has two distinct requisites: The bully must be superior in either strength or influence, whereas one can be harassed by one of lower status; the goal of bullying is to put the other person into some form of submission.

This is why bullying, as stipulated above, is a problem, whereas teasing and harassment are not necessarily so. The person being bullied has a difficult time fighting back or defending himself--emotionally or physically--because of the nature of that superior force, and in both physics and psychology superior forces dominate the weaker force. It is simply too easy for a bully to make his victim do whatever he wishes--especially drive the victim towards suicide--due to physical strength or sadistic mind games, or both. It's like using an OU team against a NU team--just to make this related to Pokemon. At least when being teased or harassed, the victim has a fighting chance. That is not the case with bullying. If the person bullying you lacks the criteria in that definition, put simply you are probably not being bullied.

Do victims have to do something? Absolutely. It is never good to be defenseless in any aspect of your life, and victims do need to develop the mechanisms to survive. However, that is far from easy. The best we can do, honestly, is to offer our advice based on our experiences and hope that helps.

That being said, bullies should never be enabled to continue bullying, because they will continue to do so. There needs to be ways to prevent it from happening--bullying, not teasing or harassment. I am a fan of the "all of the above" approach: Teach victims the mechanisms they need to survive and develop a healthful self-esteem while also preventing bullies from bullying when it is spotted.

 

[Deaga]

Ookay my story

So I've been bullied for 8 years now, fluctuating in severity. At the start it was typical childish behaviour; calling me names, pinching me, degrading me and making me feel bad about myself. I admit to not having the greatest of social skills, but I still had many close friends and there were only a select few that bullied me. I've always been an emotional child and so I react very badly to the bullying, where comments about me would make me feel much worse about myself than what would be expected. There were many reasons to pick on me in particular - social skills or lack thereof aside, such as my size, ethnicity and other attributes. It was difficult, but not as difficult as what was to come. During Year 6 (so at the age of 10) I was going okay. I was still bullied, but to a much smaller extent. There was this kid who I was close friends with. Well, during a school trip we got involved in an argument and he suddenly started ignoring me. Obviously this was distressing as I was losing a close friend. However, instead of ignoring me completely he turned on me and became the main bully towards me. He also forced many of my other friends to bully me (which did involve beating me up). So I was obviously going through a rough period during that year, where many of my friends had turned against me and I was feeling isolated.

At the start of secondary school (aged 11), what was left of my social skills had all but depleted due to my experiences during the year beforehand. As such, I found it very difficult to make friends and was once again the subject of bullying. This bullying continued to the point where I've felt consistently mellow or sad up until Year 11. While the bullying didn't stop, I did feel like I was getting more used to it.

Year 11 (aged 15, and the year I am currently just about finishing up), is a horrible time for me. I was subject to much more bullying and I lapsed into heavy depression just before Christmas last year. I think it was a case of all my emotions being bottled up from the previous years, and I had had simply enough of all the bullshit in my life, and just let it all out. The depression has stuck with me since Christmas -- but enough about my depression, since this is not the thread for it.

--

I have tried many different methods of counteracting the bullying. Seeking guidance from teachers has never worked, due to the bullies' tendencies to increase their antics towards me as a result of the teacher talking to them. Or, as in the case with my last school, they simply didn't help or understand, and so worsened it by they themselves picking on me. Ignoring what the bullies say is also a horrible idea. It really grates on you and makes you feel worse about yourself. It is also not a good idea to retort when a bully teases you. It mostly aggravates the bully. I've also tried talking to the bullies to make them understand how they make me feel. The problem is that they don't care and/or don't understand how their bullying has made my life barely worth living.

There are two methods of counteracting the bullying that I would never do

• Retaliate by beating them up. I wouldn't do this for many reasons. I am weak and frail, but I am also non-violent. I often fantasize about beating the bullies up but I can't bring myself to do it (that's not cowardice, that's being a good person), and I would be acting as a bully if I do do so, which is something I detest.
  
• Changing who I am. It feels false to do otherwise. I want to stay true to myself and not just give in to the demands of the bullies. Changing who I am doesn't do anything to stop the act of bullying; it gives them the idea that they have won and forced me to change who I am. There will be no advancement in the prevention of bullying if the victims change who they are, while the bullies stay the same

Anyway I know (just realised) this is a thread bump but this topic really deserves more attention

As someone who went through basically the same thing as you (I'm about eight years older, though), I just want to tell you this: It gets better.

Seriously, it gets better, man. Whatever those guys tell you, it's not true. You're not a bad person and you're not a failure. It's really fucking hard to just "ignore" them. I know that what they say gets to you. But try to remember, even if for a single minute a day, that what they're saying is not true. They don't know you.

And it gets better. I know that this also seems like some complete bullshit advice ("Who cares if it gets better in who knows how many years? I'm suffering now!!"). People used to tell me this and I used to think they were full of shit. But seriously, it IS true.

I'm still pretty damn scarred from all of the bullying I've suffered, but I'm mostly fine now. I've made great friends, graduated from college and taken on a physical activity (I train tae kwon do, even though I kinda suck, it's really good for my self-steem!) and everything seems to be on the right track. Back when I was 14 to 15, I honestly didn't believe I could pull this off, but yeah, I did. Back then I really believed that I'd never have friends and now I have some very special people very close to me. It's awesome, man. Don't give up hope. :) I still feel very anxious when I'm around many people I don't know and my love life is still pretty damn bad, but I'm hoping to get over these issues soon!

So yeah, this is just some advice from a 23-year old who went through the same shit as you. Be strong, I believe in you!

 

[The Fennec Fox]

Yeah, we should really weed out all those oversensitive pussies and stick them in boot camps to MAN UP and become worthwhile contributors to society. Really guys, stop attention whoring with your stupid sappy emotions, you really need to learn how to handle yourself in PUBLIC, geez!

Seriously, what issue do you take with people who DARE be sensitive and cause others the insufferable burden of having to be considerate? I'm not talking to an extreme here, just kids who are generally somewhat impressionable and bad at dealing with conflict. Honestly, I don't think that kind of attitude (namely yours) is indicative of complete maturity, security and self-assuredness, either. It won't hurt you to be a bit more accepting of others rather than shrugging them off as weak and needy. "Cold world" my ass, your personal world is as cold as you make it, and unless you're like the supreme grandmaster at avoiding any kind of emotional turmoil ever in your life, you're going to be THANKFUL to have those kinds of people around listening to you when you need it.
This is not even touching the point that bullying/being bullied is a lopsided relationship of power and that many kids are scared shitless to talk back and feeling really helpless when there are awesome people like you supporting them.

Wow, this post was considerably more angry in its first draft, but I guess I learned how to cool it down? Huh, so I might actually only cry one time in bed tonight in hopes to once be as strong and resilient as you are. Oh, if it doesn't bother you, of course.

Oh my goodness no.

IM one of those 'oversensitive' people and i just deal with it. I still get bullied to this day by being oversensitive and liking MLP. So don't you dare insult sensitive people. At least theyre kind enough to think about even bullies.

 

[jumpluff]

Flechazo

Oh my god lol. Don't use dictionary definitions for something like this, it's little more than sophistry. How does your extremely facile model (which shows you have little real-world understanding of the multifaceted ways in which bullying can manifest) assist in any way? It also ignores the very variable nature of student–student power dynamics; you can't just assign 'higher' or 'lower' status to students when things like popularity and physical prowess are not the only things that influence bullying (having a support group, even if it's just fellow rejects, can mitigate the effects of bullying; age, gender, disability, race, sexuality, presentation, class, wealth, appearance, confidence, etc. also are important factors in whether a bully will be able to successfully make someone feel shitty). Oldfashioned and unhelpful attitudes like 'such and such a thing doesn't count as bullying' only mean that children who are being severely harassed, psychologically manipulated, etc. by someone physically weaker than them will continue to be ignored/blamed for their problems. 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me' is bullshit. Extended harassment campaigns are psychological abuse, which has been shown to have powerful emotional effects on sufferers.

A lot of children don't have healthy self-esteem, meaning harassment will definitely be a problem for them—and let's be real, most kids, even who have healthy self-esteem, will doubt themselves if they are bullied, 'even' verbally, over an attribute enough. Most people, including adults, care about what others think about them; it's obvious that a child will have difficulty processing the differences in types of feedback. Are you going to blame that on them? It's the responsibility of parents and teachers to foster good self-esteem in children as much as it is the responsibility of children to develop it, if not more. Depending on the individuals involved, harassment can be more harmful than physical bullying... and it's often harassment that drives bullied kids towards self-harm and suicide. I'm not sure where you get the idea that it's even necessary to distinguish bullying types in such a way; there are overreactions, sure, but at the end of the day it's not like 'oh, I'm being harassed, not bullied' is going to make a kid feel better about themselves.

In fact, I am of the opinion that delegitimising the feelings and reactions of bullying victims based on the type of bullying they experience does enable bullying. It's already far easier for kids who are harassing others as opposed to hitting them to get away with what they do.

Story time

More anecdata: I was harassed throughout primary and high school to the point I attended three (four) different high schools and was at least partially homeschooled for most of my high school time. I had rocks thrown at me for the crime of walking past a bench of idiots with my equally unpopular friend, I was sexually harassed and something related to this happened that my school ended up referring me to the police over, I was insulted and imitated for my disabilities. Eventually my anxiety was so severe I couldn't go to school and my school basically agreed I should drop out.

So, the common factor is me, right? Yeah, I was a really weird kid, pretty much a bullying magnet. But I modified my behaviour constantly, fought back, stopped fighting back after that exacerbated the situation, told the teachers, didn't tell the teachers, etc. etc. But the thing is I'm not a weak person; in my life I've coped with brain tumours, the diagnosis of a fatal genetic disease, a domestically abusive home situation, etc. and am presently doing quite well at university. But you can't go through a decade of bullying and not have your self-esteem (mine was initially quite good) degraded tremendously by it.

Everyone got away with it, by the way. My final school took measures that were aimed at me (mostly keeping me off the campus or in designated areas in break times where I couldn't get bullied, I even had a staff escort to class at one point). I was mostly bullied by younger boys in HS. Could I have fought back? Hell no. All it would've done would've gotten me in trouble anyway. Do you know what sassing back does? Life isn't a movie, it doesn't just make the bully roll over and cry because you made fun of their home situation or the shape of their nose or something and everyone was secretly rooting for that person to get owned. I sassed back and what happened to me was so severe (and beyond the skills of the staff to cope with, apparently) was that I was told to go to the police, who advised me that if that person ever did anything to me again I should apply for what is basically a restraining order. We were thirteen.

p.s. I put this in hide tags for people like Pwnemon who find other people's struggles disruptive to their lovely insulated day, but I genuinely believe the average person can learn from the aggregated experiences of other people. I think it's important for everyone to see the diversity of experiences that bullying entails judging by the oversimplifications flying around in this thread, and I personally appreciate people posting their own stories, so I decided to post mine. Plus a lot of people have been posting 'YEAH I FOUGHT BACK AND I WON AND NEVER GOT BULLIED AGAIN' stories, and given that that kind of shit has been fuelling so many 'bullying makes a man out of you!!' posts, I think it's also worth showing that someone who can cope with things that are just as difficult to deal with, if not more, than years of bullying can suffer from bullying and that fighting won't always change the situation, especially for more vulnerable students.

Also, I'm studying for my chem final and didn't have time to run around looking for studies anyway when most of what I said is just reasoning.

Oh, and finally, I find it really funny that there are so many people on Smogon who claim that hazing made them stronger and fighting back resolved the situation, given the way Smogoners respond to people who fight back against their bullying.

 

[Flechazo]

Flechazo

Oh my god lol. Don't use dictionary definitions for something like this, it's little more than sophistry. How does your extremely facile model (which shows you have little real-world understanding of the multifaceted ways in which bullying can manifest) assist in any way? It also ignores the very variable nature of student–student power dynamics; you can't just assign 'higher' or 'lower' status to students when things like popularity and physical prowess are not the only things that influence bullying (having a support group, even if it's just fellow rejects, can mitigate the effects of bullying; age, gender, disability, race, sexuality, presentation, class, wealth, appearance, confidence, etc. also are important factors in whether a bully will be able to successfully make someone feel shitty). Oldfashioned and unhelpful attitudes like 'such and such a thing doesn't count as bullying' only mean that children who are being severely harassed, psychologically manipulated, etc. by someone physically weaker than them will continue to be ignored/blamed for their problems. 'Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me' is bullshit. Extended harassment campaigns are psychological abuse, which has been shown to have powerful emotional effects on sufferers.]

That serves as a place to start as to what bullying constitutes. Though facile, it is broad enough to encompass all different types of bullying because the common denominator is basic hegemonics--that is, the bully is talking advantage of his/her power over the victim. Every example you listed (age, gender, etc.) does involve a power dynamic. If too specific, it would leave out a lot of things. Also, it is helpful to differentiate friendly teasing and bullying because they are not the same--even though the line is fine--, and their power dynamic can definitely help tell them apart. Unfortunately, when dealing with something so variable like bullying, we have to rely on broadness to start, and a starting point for further discussion certainly is not a bad thing.

Also, I did/do not intend to delegitimize victims' feelings--quite the contrary. Like I said before, it is important to differentiate friendly teasing from bullying. That way, the said person can develop a framework for healthful social interactions and distinguish teasing from bullying. Developing social skills is not a bad thing and is not victim blaming in any way. I do not think it wise to let someone continually be socially underdeveloped because that will lead to failing relationships in adulthood. It's all about intent and power dynamics.

The example you stated--that is, extended harassment of an individual who has low self-esteem--would constitute as bullying since it involves a disproportion in the emotional development of the individuals involved and it is continuous with malice. That is not friendly teasing, and it goes beyond the boundaries of isolated harassment. Quantifying the severity of bullying is helpful because it may provide or lead to answers that can potentially solve or mitigate the situations at each tier and help victims develop the social skills they need to survive in the adult world. I'm not blaming the victim (though I admit saying "you probably are not being bullied" was badly articulated); however, victims should be provided the tools they need deal with their situation, and because that differs for everyone this broad categorization helps. Hopefully, starting from the broadness, we can get more specific.

You make a lot of good points. We should be working developing them further instead of arguing over whose approach is correct. We're both trying to help mitigate bullying and help victims. Unfortunately, this is not an exact science. It's still a developing one.

 

[pokeperson12]

Did you just NOW realise that we live in a fucked up world -_-

 

[KM]

I'd like to specifically address the whole "it makes you stronger" spiel, because I think it's particularly toxic to the issue as a whole.

The general cadence of arguments like these goes something like this: 1. I was bullied. 2. Now i'm successful/rich/well endowed/etc. 3. Therefore bullying made me a better person.

Uh, no. You're a better person because the actions you chose and the circumstances around you convened in order to make you successful. You're a better person because you have drive or grit or you were just plain lucky. Just because you were bullied and aren't now doesn't mean you've passed some brutal rite of passage that everyone must go through in order to succeed, it just means you were lucky enough that the bullying wasn't severe enough that you straight up offed yourself.

I'm fairly lucky as far as the whole bullying thing goes. There's a certain amount of requisite bullying that goes along with being homosexual in a public middle/high school, but it never amounted to anything more than emotional and verbal harassment, and I usually had a strong enough group of friends so that it didn't bother me all too much. I live in a safe and fairly tolerant city, so I'm privileged not to have to worry about my physical safety as far as bullying goes.

At the same time, I've experienced bullying enough to understand not only how it works but what it can do to a person. I can tell you definitively that my experiences with bullying didn't make me a stronger person. If anything, they weakened me. When your sexual identity gets connotatively paired with the words bad, undesirable, and freakish, it certainly stifles and weakens you. I still have a slew of social insecurities, eating disorders, and minor mental disorders that are at least partially results of the bullying I went through (and still go through to a much lesser extent).

I suppose to some extent bullying did give me a "thicker skin", in the sense that if someone screams "(BAN ME PLEASE)" I don't physically flinch anymore. However, I don't really see this as me becoming more strong and able to stand up for myself, I only see it as acclimation to an environment. Just because you get used to racism / bigotry / violence / injustice doesn't make it any less heinous, and as such, I think the assertion that bullying is a necessary and ultimately positive force is misguided and ignorant of the real consequences that actually do come as a result of bullying, not the circumstantial consequences that you apply it to.

 

[Superpowerdude]

While bullying is obviously a bad thing I can't help feeling that the world is just becoming a bunch of pussies and easily offended people the word 'cyber bullying' has popped up a lot nowadays and I am baffled as to how it exists. Being stalked online would be one thing, but people getting worked up over what people say to them over the internet to me is bizarre, perhaps I am being narrow minded and won't really understand their point of view unless I had experienced "cyber bullying" personally but idk haha sorry if I sound like a dick.

but I think 99% of kids get bullied at some stage of their school life the ones who learn to ignore it and handle it without getting emotional get left alone but then again there are a lot of factors as to why someone might get bullied (appearance, sexuality, race, etc)

 

[The Fennec Fox]

While bullying is obviously a bad thing I can't help feeling that the world is just becoming a bunch of pussies and easily offended people the word 'cyber bullying' has popped up a lot nowadays and I am baffled as to how it exists. Being stalked online would be one thing, but people getting worked up over what people say to them over the internet to me is bizarre, perhaps I am being narrow minded and won't really understand their point of view unless I had experienced "cyber bullying" personally but idk haha sorry if I sound like a dick.

but I think 99% of kids get bullied at some stage of their school life the ones who learn to ignore it and handle it without getting emotional get left alone but then again there are a lot of factors as to why someone might get bullied (appearance, sexuality, race, etc)

And how exactly can they change their personality? They were born with it remember! So they actually think deeply about what the bullies said and break out emotionally. It's not their fault they've been like this since they were born!

I myself is one of them, and it took me a long time since I finally sassed them back due to how much lies they've been telling people. Again, don't call people 'pussies'. Because they actually have it in their personality and can't change it.

 

[Superpowerdude]

Am I supposed to know how people can change their personality? Again maybe its something I can't see unless I was in a situation like that but to me it seems like people are just becoming softer. Hey I'm a 17 year old boy so maybe I don't know fuck all about bullying but I wanted to express my point of view

 

[The Fennec Fox]

Ah, sorry'. Just expressing my response too

 

[Bull Of Heaven]

Is bullying always a good thing? No. Every few months the local news has a story of another kid who was the victim of harsh bullying and killed their self. In those extreme cases someone probably should've stepped in. But in most cases, bullying is nothing more than another hill we all have to ride our bikes over.

Wasn't going to post here, but this has been bothering me. If "nothing more than another hill" is our general attitude toward bullying, then how are we supposed to spot the extreme suicide cases before they happen? Judging by my limited experience, there don't tend to be many witnesses to bullying incidents, and they're often very difficult to deal with unless the victim is willing to talk about what happened and how he/she feels. I'm no expert on suicide, having never participated in it, but I strongly suspect that in an environment where bullying is treated as something to just be gotten over, suicidal kids will be less inclined to open up about their experiences and thoughts. If you're told that you just have to get over bullying, and you find yourself unable to do that, you're probably going to think that there's something wrong with you and that no one cares. Which is precisely what we don't want in these cases.

It's obvious you have never experienced the kind of bullying that this generation has grown up in; in short, you're sheltered. The bullying climate today is vastly different from the one in the past. Instead of being one-on-one, bullying has evolved to involve a pack of people preying on the weak to climb the social ladder, unfortunately the most important thing for every generation of teenagers.

I'd like to hear more about this if you don't mind. Right now I don't buy that group bullying and targeting the "weak" are new things, so I'm curious as to how you back these claims up. I'm not really a fan of just about any the generalizations in this post, and I wonder whether that would change if you expanded on them a bit.

Two more quick things:

Ending bullying: I haven't read the whole thread in detail, but every argument I've noticed against this is focused on what bullying does to the victims. What about teaching the bullies that what they're doing is wrong? What about doing what we can to cut down on the number of assholes out there? I'm not naive about this, and I don't believe for a second that bullying will ever be eliminated, but there are plenty of reasons that it's a worthy goal without being attainable. Let's deal with more of those reasons than just one or two.

Cyberbullying: This seems to be a weak point of mine in any discussion about bullying. To put it simply, I don't see how "cyberbullying" is meaningfully distinct from regular bullying, and I'm not inclined to believe that it is. Any chance someone can explain this idea to me?

 

[KM]

Cyberbullying: This seems to be a weak point of mine in any discussion about bullying. To put it simply, I don't see how "cyberbullying" is meaningfully distinct from regular bullying, and I'm not inclined to believe that it is. Any chance someone can explain this idea to me?

Not precisely sure what you mean by "meaningfully distinct" but I'll try and cover the main problems that cyberbullying introduces.

1. Anonymity and the existence of "group chat" scenarios unrealistic in real life: Anonymity refers to the lack of social and societal checks against someone being an asshole. If you're inside a school, there are societal rules to follow, school rules to follow, and even state and federal libel/slander rules to follow. Moreover, you have the physical barrier of actually having to move your body / vocal cords in order to bully someone, which acts as a sort of check in itself. On the other hand, in a chat room, you can precisely choose the words you think will be most hurtful without much worry of social or societal implications. In the cases where you don't or won't ever know the victim in real life, the perceived consequences of hurting them with words is seen as less. (In general, being on the Internet leads people to be much more themselves and lose many inhibitions). Secondly, "group chat" scenarios refers to Internet-specific scenarios where you'll have 30/50/100 people in a room all capable of bullying the same person at the same time. Although there are certainly similar analogies of group bullying in real life, it doesn't take on the scale that it does on the Internet. What's so bad about this, though? Mostly, the whole mob-consciousness thing still applies online - if someone sees another person getting bullied by multiple people, they're more likely to join in, etc.

2. Lack of physical location: Traditional schoolyard bullying inherently takes place on a schoolyard (or any other place you visit constantly). This introduces an element of consistency and puts the bullying more in the light of "I hate going on the bus because people are assholes" and less in the light of "No one likes me ever". Online, cyberbullying victims often find it very difficult to ever escape the bullying. In countless cases, cyberbullying continues at all hours through e-mail, text, social media, and other sources - and even physically moving away may not solve these problems. Victims of severe cyberbullying maintain that this concept of the bullying never ending is what makes it so unbearable.

 

[Perfect Cell]

At the risk of sounding arrogant, I always thought cyberbullying was easier to rectify because you can report/block/ect the bully and it only takes a second. Although if it gets really out of hand such as a social group with thousands of people(think Amanda Todd was a case of this), then yeah, cyberbullying is absolutely horrible. But if it's just some asshole spamming you with "lol you suck" and the like, I can't imagine blocking him/her a few times won't solve the problem.

As a few posters pointed out, if you've got a good group of friends, those asshats who pick on you don't matter at all. Stick with them and you'll manage a lot better than if you didn't. Believe me, sometimes it only takes talking to one person to let out that anger.

On a completely separate note, while it's almost always a bad idea to start a fight with your bully, if he(or she) starts a fight with you, do whatever the absolute fuck you need to defend yourself. Even if you can't inflict a lot of damage on the bully, it's a lot better than taking an unfiltered beating.

 

[Dia]

Here's what I think: it is essential that children (and teenagers) in general are given counseling and emotional support and whatever else is needed to reduce bullying. At my school, something that really helped was create a sense of school identity and letting people know each other through non-educational field trips. I'm a high school freshman next year and when I entered middle school there was an epidemic of bullying at the school, so much that they brought in an external psychiatrist to analyze the situation and provide possible solutions and asked principals and deans from other schools for advice. After implementing a school mascot, asking "leaders within the student body" for ways to increase school identity (in the end, they started using a house system where there are four or five houses each year and greatly increased non-academic activities, such as dancing contests on lunch breaks,) and increasing the duration of non-educational field trips, the situation got better, probably because all of that contributed to people talking to each other outside of their cliques and looking at their classes as one big group instead of several small ones. Come MS senior year, and an assembly is held to "congratulate the student body" in greatly reducing bullying; reported cases of bullying dropped from as many as 50 per class to around 10. I believe things like that should be done to reduce bullying before anything else is spoken about.

That being said, if you find yourself being bullied (and you've told school or work authorities and they are unresponsive) be smart when defending yourself. If you are witty then sass them away (that's what I did.) If you are bigger or heavier than them kick their asses. Don't give them what they want, which is a short burst of anger; kick their asses. Obviously this doesn't mean bring a knife to school and it also doesn't mean try to kick their asses if they have knives or something of the sort. And if you can't fight them or outwit them? The most effective way to get them to stop is to act exactly like whatever they are calling you (especially if it's homophobic.) Obviously you can't do this with any insult, but when you can it's the most effective thing if you don't mind them excluding you (which you probably don't at this point.)

Example: Some kid was calling me a "fucking nerd" and said I think of myself as "the next Socrates." What do I say? "I don't think so; I'd rather be the next Nietzche." (spelling)

 

[KurashiDragon]

Well, as someone who was bullied, I guess I can give my opinion. Let's start off with the important bits. When I was in high school I was a tall, overwieght intimidating kind of fellow for much of it. I played football for alot of my childhood life. Physically, I had no real reason to be bullied. Emotionally..... well I was really just a big teddy bear. I was a quiet person who didn't really know how to interact with people so I tended to avoid situations if I could. I had a surprisingly low amount of self esteem and was just in general "that awkward kid who stays in the corner." I had it hammered into my head to not get into fights at a very early age so I didn't use the one advantage I had, my physical stature, to stop the bullying for a very long time. Finally, I somehow got in my head this, "if you ignore them, they'll go away" mentality. Emotionally, it was really easy to get picked on or bashed. It didn't help that I said something really bad that I regret saying to this day. To stand up for yourself isn't actually as easy as some people would think. Once you get something stuck in your head, it can be hard to break from that mentality. It took me 4 years to finally stand up for myself and it wasn't even because I wanted to. I only really did it on impulse. It helped in some ways in that it finally stopped this really bad bully. I don't believe it was just because I stood up for myself either. I was 1 foot taller and 100+ pounds heavier than my bully. Standing up for myself probably just gave them a reminder that I was physically, very intimidating. I wouldn't recommend standing up for yourself unless you actually have something to back it up.

Getting in to what I think should be done. It's honestly not as easy as standing up for yourself. It's hard to actually muster up the courage to do so and even if you do, it probably wouldn't be good to do. I would guess that the best thing that needs to happen to reduce bullying is for the school or some authority to crack down hard on it. Going into the subject of "bullying is good for the kids.", HELL NO IT ISN'T! What getting bullied taught me to do is to close myself off. Because of that, my grades suffered in school, I barely talked to anyone, and never learned to communicate well when speaking to people. All of these things are causing me trouble to this day. It's easy to type out all the problems one has on a keyboard but it's a whole other thing to get this mentality out of your head. I'm not asking for pity or any thoughts on my problems, I'm simply giving my thoughts on the matter. Bullying does more harm than good. It doesn't harden you to the outside world, it just makes your life hell.

TL;DR: There are multiple ways to get bullied and to bully. Weakness comes in all shapes and sizes. People can say, "grow a backbone" or "it's good for the kids" all they want. I know from personal experience that both of those things are complete bullshit. I don't believe it's as simple as having the bullied person stand up for themselves. It needs to be cracked down on hard by schools, parents, or anyone of authority. Bullying isn't as simple as a kid picking on someone. It's far more complicated than that.

 

[DiscoDucky]

Bullying is a leftover biological instinct for humans to establish alpha dominance in a social group. I'd honestly say that we can't eradicate bullying in its entirety. What we see as kids belittling other kids carries over to the adult world in many different forms (from the world of cutthroat investing to lab research, both of which I've had a long experience in both). Hell, look at corporations. Boiled down it its core, corporate intimidation and monopolization are just examples of bigger people snubbing out the smaller guys. A good example would be when I was in middle school. While everyone else was reading Harry Potter and whatnot, I was reading "The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" (the A. A. Milnes version of it, mind you). As luck would have it, I was automatically receiving criticisms for reading that book since many people associated Pooh with Disney. That is essentially the first biological reaction when we are dealt with oddities in a social environment: we alienate them. However, if one has valid points to back his argument while asserting confidence. This is where having effective communication skills come in. Even though I preferred an off-beat choice, by doing a combination of logical explanation and using oneself as a joke point, people become more and more accepting the oddity as more of a part of a microcosmic society such as school.

Don't take me the wrong way. In-school bullying should should be curbed to afford students safety nets that do not exist in society. However, bullying in its entirety cannot be fully curbed. There will always be the alphas beating out the smaller ones. There will always be OU Pokemon that snub out the viability of NU Pokemon and draw ridicule from the community. I'd honestly say that behaviors like bullying allowed for human civilization to advance into the modern day.

 

[HBK]

Bullies are generally insecure people who need to pick on others to feel good about themselves so if anything, kids and people who are bullied should feel superior to them. In my opinion, and this is some thing that I have implemented in my own life, the best way to deal with bullies is to threaten them and kick their ass when they don't back off. Bullying is more prevalent in the younger echelons of society and I know that the last thing that adults want is for kids to fight but anything else that you might do is likely to be a temporary solution. The only one who can stop bullies is the person being bullied by them and not any third party.

 

[The TurtleLord]

about fighting back, i used to be bullied alot, but when i punched the guy in the face and broke his nose, i got in way more trouble than he ever did (i got week suspension and heaps of detentions). granted, he only did verbal abuse, but i still think that schools are really stupid in the way they handle that stuff